The Sea

MiCHELET, as our readers know, wrote a number of works on subjects which suggest a scientific treatment—“L'Oiseau,” “L'Insecte,” “La Mer,” and “La Montagne.” The present volume is a translation of the third mentioned, and we believe that at least one of the others has been put into an English dress. These works can hardly be regarded as scientific, except in so far as Michelet seems to have taken laudable pains to acquaint himself, before writing, with some of the principal and especially the most interesting facts which science has discovered in connection with his various texts. For really the titles of his quasi-scientific works are only texts, or rather themes, round which he accumulates a vast variety of more or less appropriate facts, reflections, and word-pictures. He might indeed be regarded as the rhapsodist of science, a man of distinctly poetic or imaginative temperament, excited to enthusiasm by reflections on the facts furnished to him by science. Of course no one would think of resorting to Michelet's works to study any of the subjects he thus treats, but nevertheless his works have their uses from a scientific point of view, uses which we have often referred to in speaking of popular scientific works. “The Sea” will no doubt attract many English readers now that it is translated, and notwithstanding its rhapsodical nature it contains a very fair amount of really useful and trustworthy information concerning marine physics and marine life. But, as in his other works, Michelet skips about his subject on all sides, poses it in every possible attitude, sings about it from every possible point of view. The illustrations are charming, and the book as a whole is got up with great taste. The Messrs. Nelson have done well in publishing such a translation.The Sea.JulesMicheletBy. (London and Edinburgh: Nelson and Sons, 1875.)